What I meant is that if an incredible injustice HAS to happen on Oscar night, it may as well help me beat everyone else in the Oscar pool.

"If you are marching with white nationalists, you are by definition not a very nice person. If Malala Yousafzai had taken part in that rally, you'd have to say 'Okay, I guess Malala sucks now.'" ~ John Oliver

Best Director - Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist...this I'm less certain of. I think even if Hazanavicius wins the DGA, Scorsese is a threat and maybe Malick as well.

Best Actor in a Leading Role - Jean Dujardin, The Artist...Brad Pitt could win the SAG and then we have a spread out race. Jean Dujardin IS The Artist...but then again, Russell Crowe HAD A Beautiful Mind.

Best Actress in a Leading Role - Viola Davis, The Help...Davis wins the SAG and both leading races feature actors whose leading three competitors have won Golden Globes and a SAG. I think Davis wins it because she closes out a clearly well-liked Best Picture nominee with a speech. She's also in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.

Best Supporting Actor - Christopher Plummer, Beginners...not the mother of all locks by a longshot. Kenneth Branagh could win the SAG. He has Harvey Weinstein on his side and he's been playing the game a bit better. Between Branagh, Plummer, and von Sydow, it could go either way, but Plummer is still the front-runner.

Best Supporting Actress - Octavia Spencer, The Help...kind of a weak race in which a sitcom star like Spencer can become a heavy front-runner, but that's certainly happening.

Best Original Screenplay - Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris...please show up. Just this once.

Best Original Score - Ludovic Bource, The Artist...easiest win of the night.

Best Original Song - "Man or Muppet", The Muppets...and a Muppet song finally wins.

Best Foreign-Language Film - In Darkness...if something's going to suck, it may as well help me on Oscar night.

Best Animated Film - Rango...perfect time to honor something unusual like Chico & Rita, but Rango has Gore Verbinski, John Logan, and Johnny Depp involved. Good bet.

Best Cinematography - Hugo...prettiest picture wins, and the only two recipients of this award to not be nominated for Best Art Direction in the past fifteen years were American Beauty and Slumdog Millionaire, both sweeps.

Best Film Editing - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo...it's the most cutty film. Hugo could take it for Thelma's fourth victory.

Best Art Direction - Hugo...pretty open and shut.

Best Costume Design - Anonymous...sure looks like this film has the MOST Costume Design and Goddammit, I will not be fooled again!

Best Makeup - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Pt 2...The Iron Lady has transformative makeup but...do I dare invoke the phrase "This is where they can honor Harry Potter?" On the fence, right now leaning towards Harry Potter.

Best Sound Mixing - War Horse...between this one and Hugo. War Horse is the louder than your average Michael Bay movie.

Best Sound Effects - War Horse...a little pre-Lincoln validation.

Best Visual Effects - Rise of the Planet of the Apes...or will it go to the 3D of Hugo? Smart money is on Rise of the Planet of the Apes. I can see a scenario in which Hugo does a five or six award sweep of the technical awards, maybe with Best Director in tow, and I can also see it coming up with one maybe two. That's where I'm leaning.

Predicted Tallies:4: The Artist2: The Help, Hugo, War Horse1: Anonymous, Beginners, The Descendants, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2, In Darkness, Midnight in Paris, The Muppets, Rango, Rise of the Planet of the Apes

"If you are marching with white nationalists, you are by definition not a very nice person. If Malala Yousafzai had taken part in that rally, you'd have to say 'Okay, I guess Malala sucks now.'" ~ John Oliver

This is the situation now. Don't forget that I still haven't seen most of the nominated movies - they will open in Italy in the next few weeks - and seeing the movies helps alot. Plus, things could (only slightly, in some cases) change when the Guilds announce their winners. Anyway, this is where we are today:

BEST PICTUREI was desperately asking anyone here for a possible alternative to The Artist in this category - a title, just a title. And, like in Sicily when journalists go around and ask about the Mafia, I only got silence, and people looking elsewhere. Now the Academy has given me an answer: Hugo. The Descendants isn't out still, I know: it got very few nominations but those are key nominations... but it didn't get Best Supporting Actress, which would have been a sign of love, and not just respect, and I find difficult to believe that it can win Best Director - which doesn't prevent a Best Picture win, of course, but makes it less probable. It would get Picture, Actor and Adapted Screenplay: in theory it's possible, and it will obtain the votes of those who like family dramas better than movies-about-movies, but only after I see it I will have a clear idea about its chances. Hugo is the most nominated movie of the year and the work of an admired (more than beloved) director. It has the technical branches behind it, but not the powerful Actors branch. So I'd say that yes, we definitely have an alternative here, but not an extremely convincing one. The Artist is still the movie to beat (I know, Mister Tee, it's foreign, it's silent, it's in black and white... but don't you think that at this point, with ten nominations, it doesn't matter anymore? Its "weirdness", rather than an obstacle, is what makes it stand out from the crowd) and I think it will win.

BEST DIRECTORIn theory, I tend to avoid predicting Picture/Director splits, unless I see strong signals that it can happen, and let's face it: anyone who had the courage to direct a silent movie in 2011 will get many, many votes. It's also true, though, that it's here, more than in Best Picture, that Hugo could win over The Artist, if only because Scorsese is THE American director, not just "an" American director. And if he hadn't won before, and recently, I'd say it could happen. But for the moment I still think that Best Picture and Best Director will go to the same movie.

BEST ACTORThe most interesting Acting category, with three possible winners - Clooney, Pitt, Dujardin - with more or less (though for different reasons) the same chances of winning. I'm not even sure that the SAG will helps us much here - Clooney, for example, has never won there, but already has an Oscar.

BEST ACTRESSViola Davis doesn't have anything to do in The Help except looking noble and mistreated, but as we know it's more about the way a role is "perceived" that counts. To be fair, she's been ignored, and rightly so, by most of the precursors, but the Academy is a huge group, with an often populistic approach - it fully represents America, both in its good and in its bad sides, and it knows it, and it's even a bit proud of it. Plus, deep inside and probably unconsciously I'm sure that they REALLY feel that giving an Oscar to an overweight black actress will convince God to forgive America for its slavery, its racism, its Ku-Klux-Klan, etc. If there weren't another category where they will certainly honor an actress of this kind, Davis would definitely triumph here. Spencer's Oscar could damage Davis's chances - I know that I sound cynical and not politically correct, but it's the truth. And then there's Meryl Streep - will guilt feelings be stronger than the by-now overdue tribute to a great actress playing one of the most important women in contemporary history? I hope not and I still want to think that Streep will win - but then I also thought that Streep would have won over Sandra Bullock, whose Blind Side had more than a few things in common with The Help (including the fact - though admittedly it counts less with so many nominees - that both movies are also in the Best Picture category). My prediction? Right now, Streep, but I will know more after I see The Iron Lady this weekend.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTORAnother interesting race - Max Von Sydow's nomination could certainly change things. Not - as I have read - because the three veterans will split votes (leading to Jonah Hill's victory?!), but, more simply, because Von Sydow could be a strong alternative to Christopher Plummer, who otherwise would have easily won. He could still win, and probably will, but Von Sydow isn't just any outsider - we are talking about one of the most admired living actors, if not the most admired, and one, by the way, that while deeply European has acted in many American movies. I can easily imagine many voters - one I'm sure of: Steven Spielberg - picking him because of his amazing career, his charisma, his masterpieces with Ingmar Bergman and even just because Max Von Sydow MUST have an Oscar (or, if you like, the Oscars must have Max Von Sydow). In a year when the two most nominated movies are about the remote past of cinema, Max Von Sydow represents this past. In the end, if Plummer wins, it will be because Von Sydow's movie is really too dreadful - but let's not forget that, unlike Beginners, it's still a Best Picture nominee.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESSThe only category which we don't even have to discuss. Octavia Spencer will get more votes than the other four put together. Ah, if only surprise still happened today, like in the good old times..!

"Young men make wars and the virtues of war are the virtues of young men: courage and hope for the future. Then old men make the peace, and the vices of peace are the vices of old men: mistrust and caution." -- Alec Guinness (Lawrence of Arabia)